Predatory Instincts
by The Wandering Khan
Summary: The Special Operations Squad has been called to find a disturbance that has scared Titans away from the local forests. It boggled their minds as they rode through the forest. What could terrify a Titan so much? Another monster? A beast? Perhaps a creature of myth? However, when they find this creature...they will have to abandon their ways and dive into the dark heart of the animal


Predatory Instincts

I

The soldiers of the Scouting Legion Special Operations squadron ventured into the great forest that lay beyond them, the sun high in the blue sky. Each one of them was wary of what horrendous and deadly Titans laid in these woods, but they had their objective, and they had to complete it. Erwin Smith had organized an expedition into that neck of the woods, after there was reports of Titans avoiding that area for some odd reason. It was a curious report, as that area was normally infested with Titans on a daily basis. Smith had sent out this squad to investigate what the reason was for this, and all the members mulled it over in their heads, especially Levi Ackerman. He was thinking of many ideas about what could have driven those abominations out, especially that some of the big bastards lived here too. _Had to be something bigger…or smaller. Nothing scares a Titan easily though… _He thought in his head as he motioned his horse forward. As he did, Eren Jaeger came to his side. "Sir, what do you think we're going to find in there?" he asked. "I don't know, but I think it's best if you shut your mouth." Levi responded sternly. Eren, used to the small man's attitude, knew to shut up. In the back though, several of the members were questioning what was going on. "Seriously, what the hell could have driven out Titans?" Jean had asked. "You got me, horse-face. Maybe some giant monster." Sasha jested. Jean groaned a little at that, and Connie by her side chuckled slightly. "You never know though…it could be a human." Reiner said from the side. At that, even Ymir cracked a smile. "A Titan afraid of a human? You been smoking something over there, Braun?" she said with a smirk. He rolled his eyes at that, but then Mikasa, who had stayed close to Eren, turned in her saddle and gave them an irritated look. "Whatever it is, we're gonna find it and probably kill it." She hissed. Everyone in the back quieted at that, and poor Bertholdt, who had been listening to the whole thing was sweating even more. Despite his hidden nature, he knew that Titans feared nothing…so what does that make him? As he mulled over this in the same manner as Levi, the man held up his hand, signaling them to stop. At first, there was a smell in the air, a smell that made the soldiers cringe their noses, but then, as they cleared a brush, Levi's neutral expression broke into a vacant stare of horror. His eyes then narrowed as he took in the scene, but many others gasped at the sight. "What…the fuck…"

What they saw before them was a total scene of carnage. It had looked like a detachment of Survey Corpsmen and women that had been sent out mere days ago, but whatever they ran into…it wasn't Titans. In fact, there was even a Titan skeleton propped against a tree that had recently died, but that was irrelevant at the moment. They saw human bodies pinned to trees with what looked like arrows, throwing knives, and even their own 3DMG swords. The ones that weren't impaled were strewn across the ground, with what appeared to be some broken arrows sticking out from their skulls or backs, along with some that had their stomachs torn open, by claw or blade they couldn't tell the difference, and the wagons that had carried their supplies were stripped clean. The squad looked with grim sorrow at the aftermath of such an ambush, but then they noticed something about the corpses as they passed through: They all were either disemboweled, decapitated, impaled, eviscerated, or skinned. Sasha, Connie, Krista, and Armin felt themselves gagging at the sight of the skinned corpses, but some of the more experienced of soldiers in that squad kept their guts under control, but they were mortified that such a creature could do this. "What…what did this?" Krista asked, her voice quivering with fear. "A man…or someone that's lost his sanity." Eren said grimly as he tuned a corpse over to see that it had been mutilated. He shook his head in disgust, and then Petra appeared behind him, putting a hand on his shoulder to comfort him. "Eren…we will find this creature, and we will stop it." She said sympathetically and optimistically. He looked up at her and nodded, but the fury was evident in his eyes. Levi and Hanji then looked around, and he looked at her. "Salvage what you can find and then we move on. They don't need it anymore." He ordered. Everyone acknowledged, and then they began to look around.

While the soldiers looked around, Sasha and Connie turned up a wagon and their eyes widened a little as they saw what looked to be footprints in the mud. "Hey, we found something over here!" Connie shouted. Levi and several others approached the spot, and they saw what looked to be clawed human footprints along with a trail of blood running southward, away from the Wall. Sasha bent down and dipped her finger in the footprint, and she shook her head. "Not like any animal I've ever seen. We do know this thing was bipedal, and a mean sonofabitch." She said cautiously. Levi nodded, and then looked down the path before turning to the squad. "Eren, Mikasa, Petra, Gunther, Hanji you're with me. The rest of you, keep scavenging around and meet up with us fifty paces the way we came. Move." He ordered again, and then the teams dispersed, the six of them advancing forward and cautiously following the trail. Once they had left though, Sasha and the others were unaware of a pair of tiger-yellow eyes watching them from the thickest treetops. It leaned in and watched them with interest, and carried a black compound bow of the finest quality notched with an arrow of the same quality. The creature could smell the fear and confusion of the squad below it, and as it sniffed the air, watching the six others leave, it grinned slightly in anticipation, and wondered what their reaction would be to the display it had left for them, merely fifty paces away. _You're in my realm now…you are prey and I am the hunter…_

As the six continued down the path, each member had their own thoughts about what they would find. "This fucker's got a sick sense of killing…" Eren whispered as their horses gently trotted along, careful not to truss up the tracks. "Tell me about it. All a Titan does is just chomp down on its prey…" Gunther agreed. Hanji on the other hand, was both nervous and interested. "When we find this creature…you don't suppose that…well…we can study it and dissect it, right?" she asked, a small smile creeping up on her lips. Levi sighed and gently rested a hand on his head, and nodded. "Once justice has been dealt for those soldiers, then you can do all the experimenting you want on it." He said irritably. Hanji quietly cheered at that, but then, a branch snapping made them all quiet and reach for their blades. They all looked around, eyes darting from tree to tree as they scanned for anything, be it a Titan or their mystery killer. "Where did it come from?" Petra whispered. "It came from…over there…" Gunther said, pointing his hand to a dark tree. Levi, Mikasa, and Eren drew their swords as they gently trotted up to the spot, and the blood trail lead there, though it separated from the footprints. They expected the creature to lash out at any moment, but when Levi came to the base of the tree, he felt dripping of blood on his head, and he flinched as he looked up. His expression didn't change, but the dilation of his pupils showed how surprised he was to see a body of a Survey Corpsman…skinned, but the meat was still fresh, with flies buzzing around it. Mikasa and Eren held their noses as the buzzing grew louder when Levi cut the corpse down from the tree with a swift leap from his saddle and the body fell with a thump on the ground and the squashing of meat. Eren and Mikasa had seen the Female Titan with practically all muscle, but this…this wasn't a Titan. This was a man, one of their own kind, and the two fought to keep from gagging. Levi was emotionless as he looked over the corpse, tutting with his teeth. "This looks no more than a few days old. Soldier must've had his throat slit and then skinned alive while he was choking…" his voice trailed off as he found a note on the corpse, with a throwing knife stuck to the back. "What the…a note?" Mikasa asked as she and Eren dismounted and examined it. When Levi pulled it out, he wiped the blood away from the note then cleaned his hand on Eren's cloak, who huffed irritably, and then, with the letters written in the corpse's blood somehow, it said,

शिकारीडरछैनभनेरमानिसहरूलाईमृत्यु

Levi dropped the note at that, and looked up at the group, and then he motioned with his hand to mount up and head back.

Meanwhile, the rest of the squad was searching through more remains, and Jean was looking at one of the corpses that had several holes within it from arrows. "You know…despite how psychotic this thing is…it's a pretty good archer." He said under his breath as he got up and turned back to the group. "We should get the hell out of here. Who knows if a Titan shows up or worse our fucking butcherer." He said irritably. "We have orders to stay here until Levi comes back, and we should obey them." Otho told the young man. Jen shook his head and waved his hand over the carnage. "One thing took out sixteen Survey Corpsmen in probably less than five minutes, what the hell makes you think it won't do the same to us?" he asked them all seriously. "Well…we do got a Titan Shifter on our side, and we also have Levi…" Connie stated. "Yeah, yeah, yeah…" Jean said with a huff as he sat down on a nearby stump. Sasha on the other hand, was in some agreement internally. She was secretly scared of this creature that could so easily butcher men and women, let alone kill and scare Titans. "Y-You know…maybe Jean's right. There are other places to look and…" She was cut off by the sound of a Titan roar, and everyone stood up, drawing their swords and mounting on their horses. "Oh fuck, here they come!" Ymir shouted. She was right, as a fifteen meter Titan was charging at them, its eyes narrowed on killing the group. "Remember our strategy!" Armin shouted as they all began to activate their Movement Gears. They would have pulled off their traditional method…except the Titan stopped dead in its tracks when a sound was heard, low and droning. With that, it's eyes were wide with some fear, and it started to stumble back while letting out a small whine of fear from its throat. The sound that had terrified it grew louder as it droned, and it almost sounded as if someone was chanting in the style of the Tibetan Monks, the sounds almost melodious if one liked it. Nevertheless, the Titan turned its back and ran, leaving the group wide-eyed and amazed. Their jaws hung low as the hulk ran, breaking down trees as it did. It was then that the noise lowered to almost a whisper-like tone, and then nothing. The squad turned in the direction of the noise, and they saw the wolf-like eyes of the mysterious killer that had looked upon them from above. They blanched as they locked eyes, but they held their ground nevertheless. "What the hell are you?!" Jean shouted up to the being. It was silent for a minute, but then it leaned forward and stepped into a small beam of light where they could see the being. What they saw was different in many ways than they expected.

The light revealed everything about the being. At Jean's question though, he jumped down from the sixty foot branch, and landed on the ground as if it were nothing. Everyone's eyes went wide as he landed, and when he stood up, he looked right at Jean with those cold tiger-like eyes and spoke in a smooth but unsettling voice, "A hunter that has come home…" As soon as he finished saying that, Levi and his group emerged from the path, and everyone surrounded the hunter with grim looks on their faces. "You're gonna pay for what you did to these people, monster!" Eren roared as he aimed his blades at him. The hunter looked utterly calm in a Levi sort of manner, and turned his head to view everyone around him, and he briefly twirled his Khukri in his hand. "If I am to pay…then why don't you strike out at me, boy? Unless you're afraid of me." He challenged as he sheathed his Khukri on his right hip. Eren, not being the brightest of the squad, roared as he charged at the hunter, despite Mikasa attempting to grab him.

Once Eren's blade was in reach, the hunter pressed his palms together on one and then he flipped his entire body up in the air and brought his heel down onto Eren's back with the force of a warhammer. The young lad gasped loudly as he was practically hammered to the ground, and in the same motion the hunter let go of the blade, reached to his belt and drew two throwing knives which he hurled at intense speed towards Hanji and Levi, to which the former got her hair pinned to the trunk of a tree and the latter narrowly missed, the blade merely cutting a small tuft of his hair. When the hunter landed on his feet the rest of the squad sprang into action. Jean and Armin propelled themselves at him, only to collide into each other when the hunter opened his legs into a perfect split, the two soldiers colliding right into each other and spilling like bowling pins. As soon as they were finished, the Hunter spun onto his back, and kicked out his legs, making him rocket up. As he did, he narrowly avoided the swinging blade of Connie, who was determined to shove the blade up the hunter's posterior. The blade barely skimmed along the clothing of the man, and this made Connie take another slash with his other blade but the hunter countered by spinning quickly and drawing his Khukri in the same motion, catching the blade in the curve. He then pressed forward and practically stepped on Connie's torso, using him as a stepping stool to launch himself in the air, his foot almost missing a blow from Mikasa's blade, the sharp end taking off mere cells of the blade. However, what amazed the startled Corpsmen was that when he launched into the air, he went higher than a normal human should, and landed at the top of a tree branch about thirty feet high. He turned to see the soldiers, and several of them activated their Movement Gear, launching themselves at the hunter that turned to escape, oddly enough with a small grin on his face, disappearing into the dark woods beyond.

As the group split, Eren pulled his face from the ground as well as Jean and Armin getting up, rubbing their heads with several groans and curses towards the hunter. "Did we really just get our asses handed to us by a fucking savage!?" Jean growled. Levi shook his head as he approached Hanji. "I'm disappointed in you idiots…" he said as he grabbed the throwing knife and yanked it out of Hanji who yelped in response. "You do look nice with your hair pinned back though…" he said with a small wink, to which she chuckled aloud before his expression hardened again. Once everyone had recovered, he counted Eren, Mikasa, Jean, Armin, Gunther, and Hanji. The rest were chasing after the hunter, and Levi nodded. "Alright, here's the plan, ladies and gentlemen. We mount up and we follow the other cadets into the woods as far as we can go, and then we'll make camp when it's sundown. If we find any of the cadets, we'll circle back and get out of the forest. If all else fails though…we're gonna have to all attack at once." He said, and despite his bearing, there was a very miniscule trace of doubt in his voice. Everyone could hear it, but they didn't have a better plan. They decided to mount up, and then follow the hunter deeper into the woods, not knowing where they were being lead.


End file.
